


Light up the trenches where my heart lies (until I can see again)

by noelia_g



Series: light up the trenches verse [1]
Category: Generation Kill
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Actors, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-28
Updated: 2013-11-28
Packaged: 2018-01-02 21:13:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 20,604
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1061717
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/noelia_g/pseuds/noelia_g
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Brad Colbert and Nate Fick had met on the set of a now cancelled sci-fi show, years ago. Now, Hollywood turns out to be a small town after all, and it’s hard to avoid someone you broke up with. Especially when you both sign up for the same movie.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Light up the trenches where my heart lies (until I can see again)

i.

Nate thinks that everything really went downhill since the invention of twitter. Before that, all that his stalkerish tendencies amounted to was an occasional google search. He managed to avoid Myspace like the plague, fortunately, considering the seizure inducing backgrounds and fonts, but with the twitter, well.

Brad’s twitter is not run by him. The occasional turn of a phrase hints at Ray, possibly extensively edited by Walt, judging by the absence of four letter words. Nate’s not desperate enough for the information to visit it often, or to make a mistake of following, but he visits sometimes. Often enough.

And it is from the twitter account that he learns Brad has signed on for Screwby. The news comes three hours after Nate called Janice and said that yes, his schedule problems have been dealt with and he can definitely take the role. It’s five minutes before Mike calls and asks how Nate feels about working with Brad Colbert once again.

Mike’s probably not the first person who’s going to ask this in the upcoming days, but he’s the only one who knows something akin to the truth. He probably suspects the truth, too.

Mike’s been the one constant in his life, for the last six years. You could make an argument that so has Brad, but Brad isn’t exactly in Nate’s life anymore.

“You could always back out,” Mike says, in a tone that’s reasonable and calm and makes everything sound like a very good idea, like the smart thing to do.

“I want this movie,” Nate points out. They both know that, they’ve been badgering the scheduling agreement for weeks now, and Mike has had a few very irritating calls from Vancouver. Nate wants this role. The question that remains, the question Mike isn’t asking, is whether he wants to stay away from Brad Colbert more.

“You’re going to be pretty much useless anyway, if you’re going to mope all the time.”

“Have you read the script? Brokenhearted and shattered is exactly what they’re looking for.”

“Yeah,” Mike says, a hint of worry in his voice. And by hint Nate means it’s really fucking obvious. “Nate.”

“I’ll be fine.”

He realizes those are famous last words. He has said them in the sweeps episode of the second season, right before he got stuck in another reality with no way back.

Good times.

 

ii.

It says ‘Executive Assistant’ on Walt’s business cards. It probably says so on his contract, too, but neither he nor Ray ever paid attention to that one, really. What it should be saying is ‘Damage Control, Babysitting, and Primadonna Wrangling’.

At least he’s paid rather well, in both money and blowjobs. He’s been offered other positions more times than he can count, but Ray always counters with a ‘position’ of his own, and, well. Brad says Walt should have his brain checked, because latent masochism could stem from some serious underlying issues, but Brad hired Ray as his publicist, so he has absolutely no higher ground to stand on.

Speaking of Brad, who is responsible for the latest crisis... Well, not actually responsible, but that’s how Ray will see it, in-between a few rants about Nate fucking Fick and his artistic fucking choices.

At least Mike Wynn had the presence of the mind to call them first, before one of the journos asked Brad about his feelings on once again working with Nate. It’s the end of summer, the blockbuster season is almost over, the comic con is over and done with, and the news are slow. Someone is bound to remember the show and go for a puff piece on reunited friends.

Yeah. Walt needs caffeine. And Ray will definitely need caffeine, or he’s bound to start looking for nicotine patches, and that never ends well. (Oprah still avoids Ray and it’s been years. It takes skills and Ray has them in spades.)

“You have that face,” is the first thing Ray tells him when Walt enters his office.

So much for easing him into the thing. Walt sighs and places the coffee cup on the desk, right next to Brad’s action figure. Walt thinks Ray keeps it to piss off Brad whenever he comes by, but if that’s not the case then... so many jokes, so little time. “What face?” he tries for the innocence. It never works, Ray knows him too long and regrettably too well.

“And coffee. I told you, when you have bad news it’s best to distract me with a blowjob. Or you know, a quick fuck over my desk. I know you think Brad’s Thor figure is watching us, but seriously, he wouldn’t judge. Well, he would judge, the repressed bitch he is, but he’d like it anyway.”

Walt isn’t even going to dignify that with a response.

“More cast members for Screwby have been announced. You’re not going to like it.”

“What, did they hire Miley? That was a rumor that didn’t want to die..”

“Worse.”

“Worse? Seriously, Brad would go into an epic bitch fest if he had to work with Hannah Montana, you know he once caught one episode when he was stoned and it traumatized him for life. I know, I was there. I might have been the one to bring the joint and put on the Disney Channel, too, but you didn’t hear that from me,” he pauses to take a long sip of his coffee. A sip that deals with half of the cup, Ray has absolutely no gag reflex. Walt is happy to share this bit of information, he really is. “So, who’s fucking worse than Miley Cyrus?”

Walt shows him the screen of his blackberry.

Even he is impressed with the string of obscenities. Years of working with Ray, and years of...doing something else with Ray, and he still can be surprised. It’s good, keeps them romantic and shit.

“Yeah. That’s seriously fucking worse than fucking Miley Cyrus,” Ray says, after a good few minutes, when he’s slowly running out of steam.

That, yeah.

 

iii.

They met two weeks before the shooting of the pilot on Alternate. It was short notice, but Nate had come in to the project late, after they decided the previous guy just wasn’t a good fit for the character or some other bullshit. Brad didn’t like the previous guy, but that wasn’t saying much, he hated most people on principle, until they could prove they weren’t complete idiots.

The guy wasn’t really a complete idiot. Some parts were missing. Like, his brain. Or any kind of a sense of humor. And as Ray had so helpfully pointed out, when Brad Colbert called you on being humorless...

But then there was Nate.

Nate, who was really fucking smart, and whose sense of humor was occasionally so dry you shouldn’t strike a match around him. Brad probably was a goner during the first week, he just didn’t know it yet.

He vaguely remembers their first meeting. He’s been meeting people the whole week, the cast and the crew, all the unfortunate ones stuck in Vancouver in the worst weather in years, and Nate hadn’t really stuck out. Brad remembers thinking he looked like he’d need parents’ permit to be there.

Two weeks later they were waist deep in the mud, in a heavy rain from the rain machine, doing what seemed like the hundredth take of the same bit because Ferrando just wasn’t fucking happy with anything, and they were fumbling for the gun again and again while Brad’s fingers were turning into icicles.

He wasn’t even going to think about the state of his dick and balls. Not the best day ever.

“Why the fuck are we even doing this?” he muttered under his breath, rubbing his forehead and quite probably getting mud all over it.

“Raising the artistic value of the piece,” Nate told him earnestly. “I’ve been assured of this,” he added, and his face was guileless, serious and eager, and for a moment Brad bought it. For a moment he wanted to groan and slap his palm over his face, except he didn’t want to inhale more mud than he already had.

And then Nate smiled, starting with a small tug at the corner of his mouth, his eyes shining like he couldn’t contain his mirth and Brad shook his head, couldn’t help it but snort. “You fucker,” he told Nate, who seemed to be taking this as a compliment. It might have been meant as a compliment.

Nate laughed and ducked his head, right before Ferrando stopped talking to his assistant and turned back to them. “Let’s try this again,” he told them.

“Let’s get this over with, shall we? I’m pretty sure the next scene you’re shooting is the hotel room one, and I definitely don’t want to stand in the way of those artistic values,” Nate said, moving on to his spot, long fingers tightening around the gun.

When Brad tackled him that time, he might have been doing it with a little more intent.

 

iv.

Before Alternate, Brad had done two other tv shows. One was a short-lived drama on Fox, cancelled after six episodes, after Brad appeared in the fifth one, in what was supposed to be a recurring arc. It was there to be seen on dvd, with four more episodes in which he actually had something else to do than smile ominously and make vague threats towards the main character.

The other one was a sitcom on CBS. Yes, he still can’t get over that one.

It lasted for a season, ensured him an obscene Christmas card every year from Lizzie Caplan, and apparently made certain parts of online fandom very interested in screen capping a certain scene.

Brad didn’t care what the people online were saying, he didn’t remember getting naked at any point of that day, there was no way his dick was on the screen.

Lizzie’s Christmas cards suggested otherwise, but that was Lizzie. What could you do.

Alternate was the first he actually enjoyed doing. There were two movies in between and a few guest spots on procedurals, but he stopped before the full CSI trifecta. There was at least one show that he refused to be seen on, and Ray had backed him up, with a few rather interesting comments on the Sunglasses of Justice. Brad didn’t ask.

With this show, he was actually having fun. And it wasn’t only because he genuinely liked his co-star (the weird sort-of friendship he struck with Caplan notwithstanding. She reminded him a little of Ray, and that wasn’t exactly a compliment), the show wasn’t actually bad. You didn’t often get a chance to play different versions of the same character on a daily basis.

Second season, Nate’s character got stuck in an alternative reality and Brad went through seventeen different universes in three episodes. It was pretty damn epic, if you listened to the fan boards. Which they usually didn’t, but when Poke got drunk, he printed out the fan fiction. It was actually kind of fucking scary.

By the second season Brad was already well and truly gone. He wasn’t stupid, he figured it out during the hiatus, when Nate’s texts were something he looked forward to, something that sent his heart racing.

Four weeks into the hiatus, Nate showed up on his doorstep, heralded by a single e-mail of ‘I’m in the neighborhood, you have time?’ It probably wasn’t even an excuse, Nate’s oldest sister lived an hour away, but Brad could hope regardless, think that he wasn’t just a convenient distraction for an afternoon.

Ray had called it months before, told Brad to fucking watch out, that no one wanted to deal with him losing it and crawling under any vehicles. In Brad’s defence, he only had done that once, after Julie. Nate was nothing like Julie, even apart from the obvious. When Brad pushed, always a bit too far, dry jokes that just bordered on inappropriate, Julie got confused and doe-eyed, sweet but surprised. Nate just pushed right back, wry and bemused. It was surprisingly attractive.

And then there was acting. Julie never understood how Brad could hate almost everything about it, complain about the idiot directors and self-centered co-stars, and yet love it so much. Only other actors got it, and even then not always. Nate, however, Nate came alive when the camera started rolling. Not that he wasn’t fascinating away from the set, Brad could fucking attest that it was difficult to take your eyes off him... but he was something else when inhabiting a character.

Nate had done theatre before the show, and Brad teased him mercilessly about switching to the low-brow entertainment, everyone did, it became a running joke around the set. But fuck, if he had known Nate at the time, he would have been buying front row tickets for every night.

And let him rephrase that one. It hit a little too close to home.

Ray called it months before it started, and he was more than right, even though Brad would never tell him that to his face. Ray warned him Nate would break his heart.

In all fairness, though, he was the one to break Nate’s first.

 

v.

A few weeks after the first season wrap-up, Nate was visiting Sarah, catching up with his nieces after months of being stuck in Vancouver. It’s not that he didn’t like Vancouver, but it was the same people all the time, everyone knew each other a little too well, the same stories were told over and over again, until the subsequent retelling spun them out of control.

Vancouver, however, had Brad.

He almost didn’t notice at first. Haley and Annie had a new pup, Sarah had a new job, and Charlie was working on a tree house for the girls. It was all rather time-consuming and Nate didn’t mind at all.

Except that on the second day he took a photo of the puppy peeing on the TV Guide with them both on the cover and couldn’t not send it to Brad. They texted each other so often that Sarah started to wonder out loud whether he had a girlfriend in Canada.

She fancied herself very droll.

“It’s just Brad,” he said, and it felt a bit like lying, his face flushing, his ears burning. For an actor, he was a really bad liar, especially when he tried to lie to his family. But he wasn’t, this time, and so it was all very puzzling.

“Just Brad,” Sarah muttered. “The internet has some fun ideas about you two,” she told him cheerfully. At his look, she rolled her eyes. “Oh, go google yourself.”

He didn’t. But he e-mailed Brad and asked whether he had some time to meet up. It seemed like a good idea at the time.

And when Brad opened the door, leaned against the doorframe expectantly, small smile tugging at his lips, Nate’s stomach turned, his body warming under Brad’s gaze. He should have seen it coming then, but he ignored the feeling.

“Obviously, your life isn’t very exciting without me,” Brad said cheerfully.

“I’m still waiting for the glamour of our coveted profession to kick in,” Nate agreed.

“Nothing so far?”

“Nothing at all,” he nodded, stepping inside, his hand brushing against Brad’s side as he did, his fingers aching. “I’m probably just doing it wrong. Or maybe I’m just not a very glamorous guy.”

Brad gave him an indescribable look and shook his head. “Ray says it’s Trombley’s episode on CSI tonight. He plays a psycho,” he added.

“That’s a stretch. We should make popcorn. Are you TiVoing it?”

“Are you kidding? Wouldn’t miss it for the world,” Brad said quickly, his tone catching strangely, making Nate look up. That was new.

That feeling, Brad’s gaze, the way he hesitated, lingered a bit too long when he looked at Nate, it was new and terrifying and a bit wonderful.

 

vi.

People sometimes ask why did Ray come to work for Brad. Or why Brad hired him, or how they met, or whatever the fuck. Some morons ask how on earth is Brad putting up with Ray, but they don’t know shit, because Ray is a fucking brilliant publicist, especially when it comes to the strange and the fucking impossible.

For everyday mundane stuff and damage control he has Walt. When there’s a hooker scandal, Walt’s the person you want to handle the press. But when it’s an unfortunate incident of a drunk soap star finding himself buck naked on top of a palm tree, this is where Ray comes in.

Brad doesn’t do naked on top of palm trees, and the whole town is really disappointed about that, but still. Ray knows how to handle Brad, he’s seen him through the bad (Julie) and the worst (Nate).

When people ask how Ray and Brad met, he sells them one of four stories. Each of them is brilliant, neither of them is true, although Ray is partial to the one about the donkey.

Sometimes people ask Brad, and he just shrugs. “One day I woke up and he was there,” he says, with a put-upon grimace.

It’s something like the truth, but not really all that close.

Back to the initial question, though: Ray came to work for Brad because any other person would start cutting themselves two months into the whole handling Brad business. That, or stabbed Brad in the neck with a fountain pen, only it would be pretty damn hard to stab Brad with anything, the fucker did the intense martial arts training with Rudy fucking Reyes and he liked it. If that’s not a sure sign of insanity, Ray doesn’t know what is.

“You can’t hide from me, motherfucker,” he announces the moment he gets to Brad’s house. Technically, the moment he breaks into Brad’s house. He has a key, but he stole it. But he has had it for two years now, and Brad never changed the locks, and it’s obviously his retarded way of telling Ray he desperately needs him.

Brad is, of course, hiding. In the fucking garage, because where else. Oh, he’d tell you he’s working on something something complete and utter bullshit, but Ray knows better. He sits down on the ground and tilts his head. “So. This shit sucks hairy balls,” he says without a preamble.

Brad doesn’t even bother to look at him, just turns the screw viciously. It probably can’t go any further in, but Brad is just in that kind of mood when he’ll fucking try, and then hit it with a hammer. Sledgehammer, maybe.

Ray is gonna go and hide that Mjolnir replica. And a few other choice things.

“Hairy balls, Brad. It’s going to be a trainwreck, I can tell.”

“You blowjob skills must be amazing, because I’m pretty sure Hasser doesn’t keep you around for your sunny disposition,” Brad finally deigns to answer, pausing in his systematical torture of his favourite bike. It’s really bad.

“Fuck you, I’m delightful.”

Brad sighs and replaces the screwdriver in his toolbox, then lies back, his eyes wide open as he stares at the ceiling, hands still by his sides. Ray shifts, lies down beside him. It’s such a pussy chick movie moment he wants to choke himself. “I think I had a fucking joint somewhere,” he says, patting his pockets.

Brad snorts, rolls his eyes. “I’ll be fine,” he says, and at least he doesn’t fucking try to assure Ray that he is fine now, because Ray would find the fucking Mjolnir and smash his toes.

“Famous last words,” he says absently. He does find the joint in his back pocket.

 

vii.

Ray thinks his problems started around the time they were shooting the third episode of Alternate.

They probably started a long time before that, when Ferrando hired Nate fucking Fick, or when Brad decided he liked dick just as much as he liked pussy, or when Julie fucked Brad over so well all she left were broken pieces Ray was trying to put together with duct tape and blind hope.

So, the third episode was the symptom, not the problem itself, but this was the first moment Ray took notice. Brad had been uncommonly cheerful for the last few weeks, but Ray had been busy with trying to reign in Rebecca’s tantrums and smoothing things over at the C fucking BS, BS standing for just what you think it would, and he mostly communicated with Brad over the phone, so the cheerfulness could have been explained by, whatever, Brad scoring some good ‘shrooms in Canada.

But Ray was on the set for the third episode, mostly so he could bug Walt into finally giving up his excuse for a job and coming over to the dark side, or mostly just Ray’s side. That side was fucking awesome.

The third episode had Olivia’s character - not her real character, mind, but one of the other versions from the other verses, or whatever the fuck, Ray didn’t care about the plot all that much - tie Nate up in a hotel room. You could tell the show was classy by little things like that, you really could.

They were between takes and Olivia was getting her make-up redone, as you apparently couldn’t be playing bondage games with people from other realities and have your lipstick smudged, and Nate didn’t even bother to get out of the ropes, it would be just a few moments before they were back to shooting. He just sat up a little and chatted pleasantly with the make-up girl and with Brad, and it was Brad’s intent expression that got Ray’s attention.

Seemed like Brad found another human being he actually liked, and that shit just didn’t compute.

Ray was pretty sure Brad loved him, in his own way, but most of the time he sure as hell didn’t like Ray, and that was fine with everyone, because for a good share of time Ray hated Brad’s guts. It was what made their friendship so fucking beautiful, homes.

But there was Nate Fick, saying something with a barely hidden smirk and getting Brad to shake his head, flashing his teeth in an honest to god full-on smile. That was...

Yeah, no. Nate shifted, arms twisting in the restraints, his shirt riding just that little bit up, and Brad’s fingers twitched, edging ever so slightly towards his dick. Not that Ray was watching Brad’s fucking dick, but he was watching Brad, for the signs of the impending apocalypse, and there was one of them, plain as day.

“Alright,” Olivia said wryly, kneeling on the bed and brandishing a kick-ass knife. “Ready when you all are. Colbert, you’ll have your turn,” she added, waving the knife at him teasingly and Ray thought that fuck, that wasn’t actually the turn Brad was interested in having.

And of course Brad would go from moping about Julie to falling for pretty green-eyed straight boys, because that wouldn’t end in a fucking trainwreck.

“I don’t think Brad would need a knife,” Nate said laughingly, sounding like it was an in-joke, making Olivia laugh. But the thing was, the way he glanced at Brad made Ray’s blood run cold. Just about the only thing worse than Brad falling for a pretty straight boy would be him falling for someone interested in him, someone bound to fuck Brad over sooner or later and break his heart into too many pieces for Ray to pick up.

“I don’t fucking believe you,” he told Brad, who looked at him blankly, like he had absolutely no idea what Ray was getting at.

He probably didn’t, and that only made it worse. No advance warning and no way of executing a timely retreat before he was in over his head.

Some days, Ray just thought he would be better off just giving up. And possibly chaining Brad up somewhere where he couldn’t get into trouble.

Too bad there were federal laws against kidnapping and shit.

 

viii.

They went to the Comic Con during the summer after the first season. Olivia couldn’t be there, she was shooting a movie in New York, and so it fell to Nate and Brad to put in an appearance. Poke tagged along, but disappeared right after their gig because Gina’s movie panel was right after.

There were three important lessons to be drawn from Comic Con, apparently. First one was that while fans were absolutely lovely in the one-on-one situation, en masse they were absolutely terrifying. Still lovely, but really scary. Poke even warned them about the slash questions beforehand, because apparently you couldn’t have a tv show with two male leads and not inspire that kind of fannish reaction, but Nate was still surprised when the question actually came.

Brad, however, just leaned back in his chair, balancing it on its back legs. It seemed like it might topple over any second. “I’ve read one,” he admitted, to the general sound of approval from the audience. “We were pirates. I believe that the author wouldn’t know historical accuracy if it stabbed them with its hook, but some of the things they’ve written about Nate are strangely on the nose. He really is that much of a prissy princess.”

Nate kicked his chair, then sent him a pleasant smile when Brad had to hold on to the table’s edge for balance. “Of course, that’s Brad’s definition of anyone who can actually use a knife and a fork,” he said mournfully, reaching out to stop Brad from tipping his chair again. If his hand lingered a little longer on Brad’s thigh then, well, the table cloth hid it anyway.

The second lesson learned at the Comic Con was that Brad was a giant geek. Nate knew that, of course, no one could have a watch that needed to be plugged to their computer and not give themselves away on that one, but the sight of Brad navigating between the booths with an intent expression on his face because he knows what he wants, thank you very much was definitely a highlight of the whole experience.

Brad turned heads, that much was obvious, some people recognising him from the show or any of his other projects, but some women, and some men, just looking at an extremely attractive guy currently geeking out over some contraption. And yes, Nate had known Brad was attractive, he stood out even in this business, and not only due to the height advantage. But the sight of Brad’s smile, curious and filled with the joy of discovery, aimed at the gadget he was turning in his hands, that was something else.

It wasn’t the slow burn Nate had been familiar with before, or the cautious pleasure of Brad’s attention turned at him. That was almost visceral, an intense need to keep that smile on Brad’s face. To make him happy.

Third lesson learned at the Comic Con, at thinkgeek booth and in the middle of a slowly moving crowd, was that Nate was in love with his co-star.

One hell of a first convention experience.

 

ix.

Walt never quite understood why Ray was freaking so much about the whole Brad and Nate thing.

When you met Brad for the first time and been around him for an extended period of time, like Walt had on the set, you would be excused for thinking that either he and Ray were functionally married, or that Ray had a well-developed stalker obsession (except that Brad technically paid him for that. Probably.). You could have thought, when Ray took to glaring at Nate over his gigantic travel mug of the worst coffee Walt had ever smelled, that Ray was jealous, and for no reason whatsoever.

“Wouldn’t fuck Brad if you gave me a ladder to climb him,” Ray snorted when Walt tentatively broached the subject.

(Actually, what he did was ask if Ray was desperately in love with Brad and taking a hit out on Nate any time soon. When it came to approaching Ray, that was subtle.)

“I don’t even think they are interested in each other like that,” Walt pointed out. If they were, it was a fucking strange courtship, filled with dry comments, Nate occasionally bringing Brad coffee he picked on his way to the set in that one coffee shop Brad deemed decent, and Brad keeping on tinkering with every piece of electronics Nate owned, to increase their efficiency in the areas Nate never used anyway.

Well, fine, Walt could admit there was something there.

It was called friendship. Someone could explain the concept to Ray, and demonstrate how it didn’t always include a worrying obsession over your friends’ sex lives.

“Yeah, well, fuck you, you weren’t there for the Julie thing,” Ray muttered.

“And I told you, not before dinner, and also, how bad could that have been?”

Walt, of course, knew the story. Everyone did. Ray told it like it was a joke. ‘Brad doesn’t date, didn’t you know? Women suck, and not in the fun way either’, but there was more than mockery to it, there was an underlying warning: Brad was damaged, and you were better off staying away, it was more than you bargained for.

Ray once told Walt that there were basically two reactions to the story when Brad himself told it, as he did sometimes, wry and with a fake self-deprecating smile. In the first case, people awkwardly changed the subject, laughed nervously and moved on. Others nodded, clapped a hand on Brad’s shoulder sympathetically and went for platitudes. ‘Her loss’ or ‘you deserve better anyway’. Like that wasn’t fucking obvious, Ray said. And it was fucking unhelpful, because Brad never quite believed that he did deserve better, because Julie was the picture perfect vision of everything Brad thought he needed in his life, and what do you fucking do when the person you see as the center of your future rejects you?

“Get really drunk?” Walt suggested and Ray shook his head, segueing into his other favorite topic, the one that wasn’t Brad.

“Let’s. If you ply me with enough booze, I might even put out.”

Walt was there, some time later, when Nate heard the story for the first time. Despite himself, he was interested in the reaction. Maybe Ray’s insanity was actually sexually transmitted, but he was becoming overly invested in the Nate and Brad thing.

One of the two reactions, he thought, and Walt was curious which would it be. Ray craned his head, looking up from where he stretched on the floor where he was looking through the CDs and dismissing each one with a scathing comment. But now, he froze, a CD in each hand, watching Nate with suspicion, waiting for what he would say.

Except that Nate didn’t say anything. His eyebrows went up, and he held Brad’s gaze, the moment stretching out for long enough for Ray to mutter a curse under his breath, long enough for Walt to figure that yeah, maybe Ray wasn’t talking out of his ass after all.

After a moment, Nate shifted, leaned back a little, still looking at Brad. “Alright, I’ll just ask. That story bought you many drinks?”

The corner of Brad’s mouth twitched, moved slightly up. Ray looked at Walt like he couldn’t believe this shit. “Not nearly enough,” Brad said.

Nate nodded slowly, moving to stand up. “Come on, then,” he told Brad, and with a mock salute, Brad followed him out. “You guys coming?” Nate turned to Ray and Walt.

“No, we’re good,” Walt told him, holding on to Ray’s arm, as Ray looked like he was going to say something very inappropriate.

The moment the door closed, Ray sat up, dropping the CDs to the floor. “What the fuck was that shit? I’m pretty sure no one signed up for the whole soulful gazing into each other’s eyes made for each other retardation. I told Brad to stick to whores.”

Walt nodded. “You like Nate,” he concluded.

“He’s on probation. Still lot of time to fuck up,” Ray pointed out darkly.

x.

“And this is Brad Colbert,” says Danielle, whose daily job is that of one of Susannah’s assistants, but whose duty tonight seems to come down to dragging Nate around the hired bar and introducing him to every cast and crew member in turn. After a beat, she laughs. “Oh, that’s right, you guys know each other.”

Nate has an intense desire to borrow one of the bartender’s corkscrews and stab himself with it, turn it a few good times. It would be less excruciating, and quite probably less messy.

“A little,” he tells Danielle, smiling wryly. Plays it like it’s a joke. She nods, smiling, and steps back.

“I’ll let you two catch up, then.”

Nate has been desperately wishing for the mingling tour to end for the better part of the last twenty minutes, but he’s not at all pleased about it now. He doesn’t look at Brad just yet, can’t bring himself to. Instead, he turns the glass he’s holding in his hands, runs his thumb up its side.

“Alright then,” Brad says, shifting like he’s stepping away and Nate looks up sharply then.

“Don’t--” he says and doesn’t finish. He thinks he’d rather eat some broken glass and chase it down with pipe cleaner than ask Brad Colbert not to walk away from him. “We’re going to be seeing each other daily,” he says instead, raises his glass in a mock toast to how fucked up it is. “The least we could do is be civil.”

Brad snorts. “Wouldn’t expect anything else from you,” he says, a statement and not a jab, that’s good. “Civil. Let’s start with small talk then,” he continues, a ghost of a smile gracing his features. There are dark circles under his eyes, he looks tired. Nate knows he caught the red eye to get here, didn’t quite have the time to rest before being dragged to this party. “How’s James?”

Small talk according to Brad Colbert, everyone. Big guns first, then run over anything that survived.

“Good, last time I’ve heard,” Nate shrugs. “Moved to San Francisco,” he adds. Brad looks like the topic is boring him already. He might have been typecasted in the same mold of action flicks, but when he wants to, Brad Colbert is a fucking spectacular actor.

Or maybe he’s just not interested and really making small talk. The thought hurts more than it should.

 

xi.

When the show got cancelled, they had enough of notice for Wright to completely rewrite the ending, wrap it up in a satisfying conclusion. Nate’s great death scene got cut out in the process (he was going to come back next season, but Brad had been, frankly, looking forward to the fandom outcry at the cliffhanger), but Nate didn’t seem to mind all that much.

“Better than doing the death scene and then answering questions about it at every damn convention I’ll ever do,” he said laughingly, sprawled across Brad’s couch. He had more to drink than he usually did, but not enough to get drunk.

Brad nodded and didn’t point out that Nate was unlikely to be doing conventions appearances in the foreseeable future, two days after the news of cancellation he got a part in Mike Nichols’ new movie. Brad knew Nate’s been trying for it, without much hope of being actually able to even work out the scheduling, but now, with the show over, he was going to be able to do whatever he wanted. And Brad was pretty damn sure that whatever Nate wanted, he would get.

“You know what I will miss the most?” Nate asked, sitting up, craning his head to look at Brad, his neck exposed in the process, almost invitingly.

Brad, obviously, had too much to drink, if he was even contemplating this. If he thought that maybe what Nate would miss the most was the same thing Brad didn’t know how he could deal with losing; them, like this, here. After hours, when no matter how tired Nate was, he would find Brad and they would watch a movie, or whatever game was on, or just sit and talk shit. Brad would miss this.

But what he said was: “The middle-of-the-night shoots, when you’re running down a hill at a breakneck pace?”

“You know me so well,” Nate laughed, eyes shining.

“You know what I will miss the most?” Brad asked, bending to put his empty beer bottle on the coffee table, glancing at Nate when he moved back to sit on the couch. Nate’s expression had shifted, turning wondering, expectant. Brad’s breath caught at the look in his eyes. “Nate...”

“What will you miss?” Nate asked, shifting closer, his hand resting on Brad’s arm, Brad’s skin warming up to the touch. He could feel the sensations echo under his skin, starting from Nate’s fingertips. “Will you miss me?” Nate prompted and Brad moved, leaned in and kissed him, slow and searching, his tongue licking at the corner of Nate’s mouth. Nate shifted into the touch, parted his lips obligingly.

“I think I might,” Brad muttered, feeling Nate’s smile start on his lips.

 

xii.

“What the fuck, Brad? Do I need to explain the concept of a cell phone to you again? They have those fucking little chargers that you can actually plug in. And right now, I am seriously contemplating plugging one in. Up your ass,” Ray ranted as he made his way into Brad’s apartment. “What is the point of having an agent or a publicist if you’re dodging their fucking calls? I’m being nice about it, but Mel will fuck you up. Brad?” he called out. “You fucker, I will--” he stopped.

People wondered sometimes what it would take for Ray to shut up.

Apparently one of those things would be Nathaniel fucking Fick, clad only in a towel wrapped around his hips, making coffee in Brad’s kitchen. “Brad’s still in the shower,” he told Ray pleasantly.

“Motherfucker,” Ray muttered. “I need to sit down.”

Nate looked at him for a moment and then reached into the cupboard, took out Ray’s usual mug and filled it to the brim with coffee. “You want to go with it now?”

Ray blinked at him. “Go with what?”

“With the speech. I’m pretty sure you have one ready. I guess it will start with ‘if you hurt Brad, I’m going to fuck you up’,” Nate said calmly, leaned against the kitchen counter, holding the mug with both hands. Ray hated his smug face in that moment, but there was something else, some softness in Nate’s face that seemed familiar. He had been obsessing about the way Brad felt about Nate and apparently hadn’t bothered to think about Nate’s feelings for Brad. Fine. Maybe Fick could stay, if he stayed on his best behavior.

“It starts with: if you hurt Brad, I will indeed fuck you up, starting with a rusty nail through some of your more sensitive parts.”

“Alright,” Nate said, as if they had just made a deal. As if he never intended to hurt Brad. The determination on his face was something Ray could appreciate, but he was a suspicious motherfucker, he wasn’t about to let his guard down.

 

xiii.

Walt warned him that it would be going a bit too far, but Ray wasn’t going to let such a tiny thing like the trespassing laws stop him. Or the eventual breaking and entering charges.

Nate, to give him credit, doesn’t look surprised when he gets back to find Ray camping out in his living room. He just leans against the doorframe, arms crossed as he calmly assesses the situation. “Took you long enough,” he says. “Brought all the nails you need?”

Ray blinks at that, momentarily taken aback. “I’m surprised you remembered that.”

Nate shrugs. “That was the morning...” he doesn’t finish, just steps in, dropping his keys in the bowl on the side table. It’s comforting that he looks like something run him over, the way he never looks in the films Brad makes him watch.

And by makes him watch Ray means tries to watch himself even though it just sends him into a fucking bitch funk, so Ray considers it a duty to babysit Brad and sit through the things while imbibing huge amounts of alcohol. He even has a drinking game for every time Nate... never mind.

“To be honest, I expected you a good few years ago,” Nate continues, heading for the fridge. “You want something to drink? I should have some beer,” he adds absently.

He sounds tired, resigned. Anything Ray had planned, and he had a few good ideas, really, seems like a serious overkill now. “Beer’s fine.”

“I didn’t know he was even considering the role.”

Ray snorts. That’s not even the biggest problem here. “Yeah, well. Crying over spilled milk and all that shit, not gonna be helpful, homes. I just need you to... I don’t know, not fuck with his head if you can actually help it. Cut the puppy dog eyes and the soulful looks.”

“Stay the hell away from him and you won’t have to hurt me?” Nate supplies helpfully, his mouth twisting in a half smile, half pained grimace. “Believe me, Ray, hanging out with Brad outside of the set is the last thing I want to do. He walked out on me, remember?”

Ray doesn’t point out it’s Brad, that Nate should have expected it, should have seen it coming. For all the wordless communication and shit, Nate had really missed that one, hadn’t figured out that Brad would do his best to push away everyone he actually gave a shit about. The more he cared, the harder he’d push. Not everyone had Ray’s perseverance.

Maybe if Ray had said something back then, but he was too angry to play the motherfucking yenta. You get what you are given and it ain’t good whining.

“Just remember that I’m watching you,” he tells Nate without venom. He sounds tired to his own ears. “Fuck.”

Nate nods, hands Ray a bottle of beer and sits down opposite him. “So, how’s Walt?” he asks conversationally.

They’ve been friends on the set. Not only Brad and Nate, but Olivia and Poke and Walt and Wright and the rest, and, when they visited, Ray and Mike. They used to hang out and then they didn’t, and at least Brad has Ray and Walt now, no matter how he complains. Olivia has her new show, Poke’s been busy with Gina and the littlest Pokeling, and besides, apparently after that one party Nate didn’t really keep in touch with Poke, apart from the occasional e-mail.

If there was a divorce, it was Brad who got the kids. Ray hadn’t really considered that before. He sighs. “Walt’s planning to take over the company, as always. He’s fucking dangerous.”

Nate watches him for a moment, then nods, smiling slightly. “I’m happy for you,” he says.

Ray shakes his head. “So am I, but don’t tell him that. His head is big enough as it is,” he mutters and takes a swig of his beer. Sometimes he forgets how much he actually likes Nate fucking Fick, when the guy isn’t fucking with Brad’s head and heart.

That just makes everything fucking difficult. Ray’s life would be so much easier if everyone around him weren’t such morons.

Except Walt. Walt’s alright.

 

xiv.

The wrap-up party lasted until the small hours, Brad heard, but the six of them moved out earlier, after Poke and Ray got into a heated discussion of their respective poker skills and roped everyone else into playing a game. Nate rolled his eyes goodnaturedly and booked them a hotel room upstairs.

“You just know that at some point, Ray’s going to toss his shirt into the pot, and I’d rather not be in the hotel lounge when that spins out of control.”

Brad laughed at that, his fingers brushing against the back of Nate’s hand when they both reached to press the elevator button. “And when it does spin out of control, and you lose your shirt because your poker face is fucking awful, it’ll assure we have a hotel room I can kick everyone out of,” he added.

“Strategic planning,” Nate agreed pleasantly, his voice sounding a little breathless, probably due to the way Brad moved to press him against the elevator’s wall, their bodies lined up, Brad’s hand sneaking under Nate’s shirt, running up his side. “We’re not fucking in here,” Nate warned him, but since his last words were whispered into Brad’s neck, before he run his tongue down the side of it, teeth grazing the skin at Brad’s pulse point... the warning wouldn’t be difficult to disregard.

But they’d have time for this later, and now Brad was content with just placing a kiss on Nate’s temple, his fingers resting comfortably on the nape of Nate’s neck.

“I am greatly tempted to kick everyone out right now,” he told Nate, eliciting a smile pressed against his skin.

“How about this. If you win the game, I’m going to suck your cock after you kick everyone out.”

Brad gave him a look. “You’re going to suck my cock anyway,” he said, stepping back as the elevator doors opened. “What if I don’t win?”

“You’re actually contemplating that?” Nate asked, his jaw dropping in an overdone show of surprise. “If you lose, I’m going to tie you to the bed and do whatever I want with you.”

“And that’s an incentive for me to try to win?” Brad shook his head. “Honestly, Nathaniel, this is a whole new side to you that I’m seeing now.”

Nate shrugged. “Just trying to make the best use of the time we have before you’re off to shoot that guest spot. Ray’s been talking about it to no end and I’m well aware there’s a sex scene involved. Need to make sure you remember who you’re coming back to,” he said, his tone light and laughing, enough that Brad knew he was joking.

“This newfound possessive streak of yours is...” he paused as Nate turned on his heel, walking backwards as he looked at Brad, eyes laughing. “Very attractive,” he concluded, when they stopped in front of the room’s doors, Nate leaning against them, head tilted up, licking his lips. “And inside, Nathaniel. Or your rule about no public sex is going to get broken,” he said, reaching past Nate to turn the doorknob, breathing out into Nate’s mouth as the shift got them closer.

“More than we wanted to know,” Ray piped up. “Way more. Also, high time, Poke needs to be taken down.”

“Remind me again why I shouldn’t kick them all out now?” Brad muttered and Nate shrugged.

“My room. Play nice. It’ll be a while until we can get together like that again,” he added, sitting down, pulling at Brad’s sleeve to get him to join them.

“Yes. I’m very happy about that one,” Brad muttered darkly.

“Whatever,” Ray rolled his eyes, handing Brad a deck of cards. “Just deal and fucking shut up, you know you’re going to miss us. Especially Nate, when he fucks off to London to shoot his pussy movie of existential pain and shit, okay, but me and Walt, we’re going to Vegas, because, can you believe it, he’s never been. I give it a week, a week, Brad, before you call me up, because sitting in your apartment and eating ice cream and listening to All by Myself is just not cutting it anymore, and it’s either calling me and crying your little heart out, or jerking off to Nate’s sex scene from episode fucking fifteen, and that would be just sad.”

“How much did he have to drink?” Nate asked slowly and Walt shook his head, his eyes comically wide.

“Speaking of London, you called them?” Mike asked Nate quietly, enough that Brad almost didn’t catch it. Nate shook his head, his eyes flickering to Mike’s face pointedly, as if telling him to cut it.

“Didn’t get a chance. I will,” he muttered back, and if Brad wasn’t watching Mike with some curiosity as to what the fucking fuck was going on, he’d miss the flash of a look he shot at Brad, worried and slightly exasperated.

“Brad, there in your hands? Those are cards, not your dick,” Ray said, obviously at the point in his evening where he forgot about something as insignificant as using his inside voice. “No need to fondle them like that, just fucking deal.”

Brad did just that, but his concentration was shot to hell, his thoughts circling back to the look of irritation on Nate’s face at Mike’s comment. It was a puzzle, and Brad fully intended to get to the bottom of this.

Few hours later, he did get to kick everyone out, or at least kick Poke and Ray out, and politely ask Walt and Mike to make sure no one got lost, or humped a signpost on their way home or whatever. Nate was cleaning up, picking up all the beer bottles, because it wasn’t like the housekeeping could take care of that later. That was Nate for you.

Brad came to stand behind him, arms around Nate’s waist. It was enough to provide a distraction and Nate relaxed against him, his right hand moving to cover Brad’s, lacing their fingers together. “Hey,” he muttered and Brad breathed in, his arms tightening around Nate.

“They have this thing called housekeeping. Leave it,” he told Nate and Nate shifted, turned his head just so Brad could catch his eyeroll. “What was Mike getting at?” he asked and Nate looked away again.

“Nothing important.”

Sure. The other one had bells on. “Nate.”

“Brad,” Nate shot back immediately, stepping forward, turning to face him. Brad didn’t like the loss of contact, his body never felt quite so perfect when he could feel Nate all over. But he didn’t move, Nate was being deliberately evasive and Brad felt a sense of dread creeping up; this was important, somehow, and Nate was keeping it from him.

It scared Brad more than he’d like to admit.

“It’s nothing, Mike’s overreacting,” Nate tried again.

“Yes, that’s Mike Wynn, the drama queen,” Brad pointed out. “If you don’t want to tell me, that’s fine. Just don’t fucking downplay it if it is important.”

Nate sighed, his hand twitching nervously, and he raised it up, ran his fingers through his hair, messing it up. It stuck up on his left side, he looked as if he just rolled out of his bed. He could be rolling into it, if Brad wasn’t intent on pressing the issue, and he hated himself for this, but he needed to know what was going on in Nate’s head, what Mike was worried about.

“I’ve been rethinking taking the role. I’m not sure I want to commit to something that will keep me in Europe for that long.”

It didn’t make sense. “You wanted that part. Badly, if I remember.”

“There are other things. In the States,” he added, and the way he was looking slightly to the side, not quite at Brad, told Brad pretty much everything.

“Don’t turn it down because of me,” he said, a cold shiver running down his spine.

“I’m not,” Nate said, too quickly. “Not just because of you,” he amended. “My family is here, my younger sister just had a baby, everyone I love is here. There are other roles here, good roles, and I’m just thinking it over.”

Brad had been punched a good few times in his life, and the sensation he felt when Nate’s lips formed the word ‘love’ was just like that, only more intense. They hadn’t yet gotten to that, but judging by the visceral reaction, Brad’s heart already decided. And wasn’t that just fucking fantastic, considering.

“Alright,” he said, and watched the relief flash across Nate’s face before he stepped forward, his hand on Brad’s chest.

“Stop worrying about it,” Nate said and gently pressed his mouth against Brad’s, not hesitant but careful. Brad held him close, let Nate lick his way into Brad’s mouth, tug at the collar of Brad’s shirt, his hand on Brad’s neck, palm over his pulse point, warm and steady.

He let Nate think the matter was firmly dropped, that Brad gave in. It wasn’t a fair thing to do, but Brad needed to be selfish for a few moments more. Needed to feel Nate all around him, just for now.

Nate was probably going to be fucking pissed at him, later, but that would be good, that would be easier. Easier now then later. That movie was of the kind you didn’t turn down, and Nate needed to take the part. Needed to leave. Brad couldn’t be the one for whom Nate fucked over his fucking career, wouldn’t be able to take it when Nate realized that.

But for now, just now, he could have Nate moan his name into his mouth, kiss Brad like he was chasing the taste of it, his fingers insistently undoing Brad’s shirt. Just for now.

 

xv.

When Nate woke up Brad was already dressed, talking to the room service in a hushed voice as the man brought in the breakfast.

“Morning,” he greeted Nate as the doors closed, when Nate came out of the bedroom.

Something was wrong. Nate couldn’t quite put his finger on it, but something in the tight set of Brad’s jaw, the tension in his shoulders. It was new, and strange, and worrying.

“There’s bacon,” Brad offered, his voice deceptively light.

Nate shook his head, ignored the tray and the smell of fresh coffee. “What’s going on?”

Brad looked straight at him then, and the strange kind of seriousness Nate could see chilled him to the bone. “My flight is in three hours.”

Brad wasn’t due to leave until the next day, same flight Nate was taking. Nate was going to change planes at the LAX but they would have three hours at the airport to, well... “What happened?” he said, a note of worry creeping into his voice.

“Nothing happened. Just catching the earlier flight. No point in hanging around here,” he added calmly, then shrugged. “I’ve been thinking. You should take that job in London.”

It was an apparent non sequitur, except Nate could tell it was anything but. “You’ve been thinking,” he repeated, shaking his head. “Somehow this fills me with dread,” he tried for a joke but it fell flat, lost somewhere in the few feet of the space between them. “Brad.”

“Your family will more than understand, it’s a great opportunity. There’s really nothing keeping you stateside.”

“Nothing?” Nate asked with disbelief, taking a step forward. “You’re here,” he pointed out. He was too confused to play games, to take time and guard his words and school down his expression. Brad’s mouth tightened and he closed his eyes briefly.

“Don’t stay for me, Nate. It’s not worth it.”

“What? This? Us?”

“What we ha--had isn’t worth destroying your career before it properly started,” Brad said, the small slip not unnoticeable but covered up quickly. “And you won’t be burdened by the typecasting either. I thought I’d make it easier for you now.”

Nate was wide awake now, the confusion turning into anger. “You considered asking my opinion?”

Brad looked straight at him, held his gaze. “No,” he said plainly. He might had as well punched Nate. That would probably hurt less.

Nate’s hands balled into fists, clenched tightly enough to be painful, his fingernails digging into his palms. Brad hadn’t moved, still standing next to the breakfast tray, his left hand resting on the edge of the table, completely still.

“I’m surprised you didn’t leave in the middle of the night,” Nate said finally, slowly, his voice somehow completely level and unwavering. He knew, as he was saying it, that it was a low blow, but he wasn’t quite seeing clearly. At that moment, he wanted to hurt Brad, wanted him to lose at least part of his cold calm. See any kind of emotion, something. “You could have done something classy, left a note on the nightstand.”

Brad’s expression didn’t change, Nate didn’t expect it to. But his fingers tightened on the edge of the table, the slightest of tremors making them twitch and Nate felt a shadow of satisfaction.

“Thought about it,” Brad nodded. “But I thought I’d save us a few awkward phone conversations by clearing everything now.”

Nate opened his mouth, the response pressing against his lips, but he stopped himself, bit back the words. He could lash out, yes, but he didn’t have the strength for this. He couldn’t quite understand what happened in the space of the last few hours, but he knew better than to ask.

“Alright,” he said, his own voice sounding distant to him. “If that’s all you wanted to tell me, I’d appreciate it if you left now.”

Brad blinked, as if he didn’t expect Nate to give in so quickly, as if he was bracing himself for an argument. “I wanted...” he started and Nate nodded.

“You made it perfectly clear what you wanted,” he said coldly. “Now you have a flight to catch and I have a call to make.”

“This is it, then.”

“I suppose so,” Nate nodded again, decisively. “It’s been a pleasure working with you. I guess we’ll see each other at some point.” He kept his voice level, almost light. He didn’t see Brad’s reaction, his vision was too blurry for it now.

“See you around, Nate,” Brad agreed, stepping away, the doors clicking shut almost inaudibly.

Nate could still hear Brad’s footsteps moving away, and when the sound faded he lowered himself to the floor where he stood, leaned against the back of the couch and put his head in his hands, breathing slowly. His face was flushed, cheeks burning, but other than that, he could feel the cold from the open window, goosebumps on his forearms. He should get up, put on some clothes other than his boxers, but he couldn’t will himself to move, his legs numb.

The skin of his neck itched and he touched it tentatively, the sensitive patch where his neck met his shoulder, in the space Brad left his mark last night. Few hours ago. When he whispered things against Nate’s mouth, traced Nate’s skin with his hands and his tongue.

There was still time to go after him, run downstairs, still time to catch up with Brad.

Nate clenched his fists to the point of pain and didn’t move.

 

xvi.

So, it went like this: Ray went to Vegas with Walt, they almost got hitched, but Walt refused to be married by an Elvis impersonator and Ray refused to be married by anyone else, and then when they came back, Brad was so fucked up he hadn’t left his garage for over a week.

Maybe to go to the bathroom, because Brad had this thing about shitting, but other than that, garage all the way. He wasn’t yet humping his fucking bikes but it was a close thing.

“Fuck, I knew it,” Ray said, shaking his head. “Nate fucking Fick and his fucking green eyes and his cocksucking lips. I knew he would break your heart. Don’t worry, homes, I know a guy, used to work for the Chicago mob. He can deal with the fucker, and cheap.”

“Leave it, Ray,” Brad told him, not even trying for insults or obscenities or any fucking degree of emotion. He just downed his glass of scotch and looked away.

“No, seriously, he’ll do us a good deal. I know Fick’s in England, but I’m sure Joe knows people on the other side of the pond who could drown him in the Thames or something.”

Brad drew himself up and went inside the house. Ray knew the drowning part would cheer him up. He followed Brad to the kitchen and watched as Brad programmed the coffee machine. “I broke up with him,” Brad said after a moment, so quiet Ray almost didn’t hear the soft admission over the sound of the coffee maker.

That was... unexpected. It shouldn’t have been, Brad, after all, had a long and proud history of emotional retardation, but Ray had seen the way he looked at Nate, he was pretty damn sure it would end with a fucking commitment ceremony because they would be pussies who hated Elvis, just like Walt.

“Why the fuck would you do that?” he asked, a stray thought appearing. He didn’t think so, but... “He fucking cheated on you or what?” That would just take a cake, after that bitch Julie.

“No,” Brad said fast, turning on his heel. “No,” he repeated calmly, looking away. “It was my decision, it’s for the better. Now, fuck off, call me if there’s something actually happening with that miniseries and let it fucking go.”

Ray let it fucking go, because when the vein in Brad’s neck started to throb like this, it was time to vacate the premises and look for cover.

“I just don’t fucking get it,” he told Walt later that day. “You saw them at the poker night, they were so wrapped up in each other you could reach into Brad’s throat and pull out Nate’s tonsils.”

“One, that’s fucking disgusting, you hick,” Walt shook his head. “Two, I called Mike. He says Nate refuses to speak on the subject but he’s pretty much a basket case. Mike says he’s not staging an intervention just yet because it’s making Nichols happy as a clown, Nate’s at the perfect stage to angst his heart out and bleed all over the set, which is mostly what they want from him, so...”

“Yeah, that’s fucking great, maybe he’ll have a fucking Oscar to show for it. In the meantime, I have to fix Brad. I fucking knew it was gonna end like this. I only didn’t know Brad was going to be the more retarded one. Should have bet on that one, though, it was high time for his PMS to make an appearance.”

Fucking Brad.

 

xvii.

It takes Nate two days to realize it’s not working out. It’s probably less obvious to everyone else, anyone who isn’t aware of how well they used to play off each other, but people notice that their previous chemistry, the one that made Alternate a cult favourite, is pretty much gone.

It’s a no-brainer, really, when they were shooting Alternate Nate trusted Brad implicitly, could open up and let Brad see everything. Now, he barely has the guts to look him in the eye when the take doesn’t require it.

As he said, people are starting to notice. “Maybe you need a few days,” Susannah tells him kindly. “Take the rest of the day off, the weather is fucked anyway. You and Brad go and catch up, find your zen or get stinking drunk,” she smiles and Nate reads between the lines: fix it, and soon.

They’ve been sitting stiffly in the hotel bar for half an hour. Brad barely said a few words together for the entirety of that time. To be exact, he said seventeen words. Nate wasn’t counting at first, but at some point he needed the distraction. He doesn’t know what he’s doing here.

No, he knows. He’s here because he needs to be able to tell Susannah they went out for a drink and talked. True enough.

He’s here because as much as it hurts to be this close to Brad and not be able to reach out and touch him, it’s still something. Like catching a breath after a long run, like regaining balance.

Nate realizes he’s pretty pathetic, but you try to forget Brad fucking Colbert once you had him for even the shortest of moments, when you saw him smile at you like you were the only thing in the world that made him this happy. Lose that and then try to forget.

Brad smiles then, but it’s far from the smile Nate would hope for, it’s sharp and painful. “This is really fucking shitty, isn’t it?” he asks wryly, like he can’t even believe it.

Nate shrugs. “Pretty much,” he admits. He catches Brad’s eye without meaning to, and a shiver runs down his spine, a renewal of the old connection, there even before they started anything. “I keep waiting for Susannah to thank one of us.”

“Well, she’s not going to cut the Academy nominee loose, so I think you are safe. I should just give up and go back to the CGI vehicles,” he adds and stands up, tossing a few bills onto the counter. “See you around,” he says, and it echoes in Nate’s skull.

It also distracts him enough to take a moment to catch up on the whole thing, and when he does, Brad’s already gone.

Fucker, Nate thinks. Motherfucking idiot.

He doesn’t really think about where he’s going, but he’s not surprised when he ends up in front of Brad’s doors, knocking on them hard. Should have done this a long time ago, but that ship has sailed. There’s other things he can salvage, though.

“What the fuck are you doing here?”

Nate nods pleasantly. “Ever so charming. May I come in?” he asks, already stepping forward, and the element of surprise seems to be working, because Brad steps out of his way, letting him in. “You’re an idiot,” he says once the doors close and Brad follows him into the main room.

“Would you like to sit down? Have a drink?” Brad crosses his arms over his chest. “I like to make sure my guests are comfortable before they start insulting me.”

“I think I’ve had enough to drink already, but I could go for a cup of coffee,” Nate says matter-of-factly.

Brad gives him an incredulous look but moves on to make one anyway. Nate watches him for a moment, takes in the efficient movements, the slight hesitance in Brad’s step, the uncertain look on his face he tries to cover with a smirk.

“We were friends first,” he says and Brad doesn’t turn, doesn’t move a muscle, and it must take some effort, Nate can tell from the set of his shoulders. He can tell, and that pretty much is his point. “Before we were together, before everything, we were friends,” he repeats and his voice doesn’t break and doesn’t waver. Nate’s pretty damn proud of this.

He steps around the table and looks at Brad, raises his eyebrows questioningly. Waits for Brad to confirm or deny. Brad nods, slowly, his mouth tight and his gaze almost too steady, almost unseeing. “Yeah, we were,” he says finally.

“Then you need to know this. If you try to walk out on this movie, I’m not even going to wait for them to find a replacement, I’m going to be out of here five minutes after you are.”

“You can’t just do that,” Brad shakes his head minutely, his eyes wide.

Nate shrugs, takes one step forward. It is a bit of a mistake, it’s too close, he could reach out and touch Brad and his fingers ache with the possibilities. But it seems to be disconcerting to Brad too, and that’s something to marvel at. “You no longer get to tell me what I can and can’t do,” he says calmly. “It’s your decision, but I’m not backing out from what I said. So, you can either figure out how to work with me, or you can leave, but in the latter case I’d appreciate if you told me now, so I wouldn’t have to go and look at the apartments on Friday.”

Brad stares at him and Nate can almost feel the heat on his skin. He holds Brad’s gaze and waits, his head tilted to the side, and he can pinpoint the precise moment when Brad gives in, his shoulders dropping a fraction. “Alright,” he says, his voice surprisingly soft. “We were friends first,” he repeats, a gentle admission in a voice that Nate didn’t expect to hear again. “About that coffee, then?”

“If it’s no trouble.”

Brad snorts, shakes his head as he steps back, ducking his head. “Figures. First you offer me a rant worthy of Ray Person and now you worry about causing me any trouble. You’re so full of shit,” he says, and it doesn’t quite hit the right note, the remark awkward and clumsy, but it’s a trial run.

Nate shrugs. “With my day job, how can you blame me?” he says and sits down. It could be the stupidest thing he’s ever done, but for the first time in a long while, he feels a small buzz of excitement in an almost forgotten place deep inside.

It probably is the stupidest thing he’s ever done.

xviii.

Brad wasn’t going to attend Poke and Gina’s anniversary shindig, for various reasons and most of them not even connected to Nate Fick. He was supposed to be busy with the reshoots, but half of their cast and crew was down with a flu, including the director and two leads, so Brad unexpectedly had some free time.

And Nate was supposed to still be in England.

But then Gina called and asked, and Poke ranted at him for half an hour, and even Ray told him he should be going out more. It was this or getting roped into a fucking bachelor’s auction or some other shit Ray had been threatening him with, so Poke’s party it was.

And then he walked in and there was Nate, in Poke’s backyard, holding a glass of whiskey in his fingers, turning it absently, his thumb stroking the side. He looks... fuck, it sounded ridiculous, but Brad’s mouth watered at the sight. He hadn’t seen Nate in person since he had walked out of that hotel room.

Brad had been right in one thing; Nate needed to take the role. It made him more than recognizable, there was buzz of an Oscar nomination already, it had gotten him a string of other offers. Point for Brad, except he wasn’t really keeping a score, because mostly, he lost, big time.

Because the other worry of his, that any kind of a public relationship they might have started would hurt Nate’s chances of being offered anything but a certain kind of roles... that went out of the window when Nate came out, a few weeks ago, quietly and without a fuss, two interviews, including one for AfterElton, and had been seen out with someone already, a liberal, Ivy League idiot of a writer. Not that Brad followed the thing in the gossip rags, not at all.

That didn’t change the fact that Nate was slated to star in a caper comedy with Zooey Deschanel, so apparently he wasn’t in any danger of being typecasted. Then again, it was Nate, everyone could see how fucking talented he was.

Nate looked up just then, his eyes immediately drawn to Brad’s, as if working with a set of fucking magnets. He started to smile, Brad could see it plain as day, the corners of Nate’s mouth rising in recognition, his eyes shining. The smile that was once just for Brad, was still there for him. And then it disappeared, gone in an instant, when Nate’s brain caught up with the instinct, the brilliant smile replaced by hurt, quickly covered with a mildly polite expression of disinterest.

Yeah, Brad was aware he did that to himself, that he was the one to fuck it all up, but he did feel a momentary flash of anger at Nate, at Nate being there, and with a guy next to him touching his arm absently as he spoke, with familiarity Brad once claimed for himself.

Nate nodded slowly, shifted almost imperceptibly as if he wanted to move in Brad’s direction. Brad wasn’t sure he could take this, if he could stop himself from giving in, throwing all the caution to the wind, kissing Nate senseless and to hell with consequences. He couldn’t, he wasn’t strong enough to deal with the well-deserved rejection, and he was even less prepared for the slight chance that Nate might kiss him back.

So instead of going over to Nate, he turned on his heel and walked away.

It was becoming a habit.

 

xix.

Brad Colbert was doing his very best to put Ray in an early grave.

It’s not like Ray hadn’t had an advance warning, Brad had been threatening to kill him for years, or, when he was in a good mood, to cripple him or rip off his dick. Good times. But this time it seemed that he was on a very good way to give Ray a heart attack.

“I admire your quest to turn the US fucking Weekly into the Brad Colbert newsletter, but you could slow down a little, I’m pretty sure they can’t print shit out as fast as you go through all those girls,” he told Brad pointedly. “If you want variety, try hookers. They’re discreet, that’s the whole fucking point.”

“Weren’t you the one who encouraged me to get out of the house? Besides, Kate’s just a friend.”

“And so was Veronica and Nancy and Jessica and Lynda and Iza. Seriously, I hope you’ve stocked up on condoms. I actually think you’re singlehandedly keeping fucking durex in business.”

“If you think I’m having a safe sex discussion with you, you’re sadly mistaken. If you think I’m having any kind of a sex discussion with you, you need your brain checked, possibly for syphilitic brain damage. And tell Walt to get himself tested.”

“Fuck you, Colbert,” Ray said pleasantly then sighed, tearing off the first page of the People magazine and starting on a paper crane. “I appreciate passive agressive dickery as much as the next guy, but it’s bordering on unhealthy. And if you’re trying to get him back by making him jealous then, well, I weep for you, because you’re a fucking idiot.”

“It has nothing to do with Nate.”

Ray raised his eyebrows. “And yet you knew exactly who I meant,” he pointed out. He knew he wasn’t off by much, it was about Nate. Not an attempt to get him back, Ray knew better even as he accused Brad of just that. It was to reinforce the point, drive a further wedge between them. Brad was making sure he not only burned all the bridges down but also filled the moat with molten lava.

Brad was nothing but thorough, especially now that Nate was back in California, shooting that caper flick in San Francisco. Brad was probably figuring out that it would be harder for him to drive there and beg Nate to take him back if Nate thought him an asshole who couldn’t keep it in his pants. Preemptive strike worthy of Brad Colbert: efficient, deadly, and fucking himself over in the process.

And Ray didn’t mind a strategy like this in a client, all the dates kept Brad’s mug in the press and kept the public interest going, with this and the miniseries the scripts were coming in, Brad even made it to the shortlist for Thor... but when it came to seeing a friend do this to himself, that fucking sucked.

“Hookers would be healthier, Brad,” he muttered.

 

xx.

Brad met Zoe in November, if you believed the gossip rags timeline. Nate didn’t usually, but this time he had little else to go on. The papers had dismissed it as another in the long line of Brad Colbert’s non-relationships and apart from the three pictures of them getting coffee together, it was altogether a non-event.

Nate knew better. Brad didn’t date co-stars, not since Nate at least, and Zoe was different than any other girl featured in the People magazine with him. Brad seemed to actually genuinely like her. Nate couldn’t tell if they were sleeping together or not, if Brad was in love with her or not, but Brad didn’t enjoy the company of many people and he did enjoy himself with Zoe, that much was evident.

Nate wasn’t really surprised when their relationship continued, when they were seen out and about for a good few months, when they allegedly spent the New Year’s Eve in Hawaii. Crushed, sure, but not all that surprised.

“Just let it go, Nate,” Mike told him quietly, shaking his head. It was actually a bit worrying, because Nate had never even breathed a word to Mike about the development of his stalkerish tendencies, but there you were, Mike Wynn knew everything.

And then Zoe was gone from Brad’s life and honeymooning in France with the guy who played Brad’s nemesis in their movie, and the entire blogosphere had a collective fit because no one had seen that one coming.

Nate did the third stupidest thing he could do and called Walt. (The second stupidest thing would be calling Ray. You could probably guess the first.) “How is he?” he asked and Walt sighed loudly and Nate could tell he was shaking his head.

“I’m not sure...”

“Walt, if you don’t tell me, I’m going to call Ray. And he will tell me, because he will take a great pleasure in ranting at me, but that conversation would get back to Brad and I don’t think any one of us wants that.”

“People don’t give you nearly enough credit for being a manipulative asshole,” Walt said not unkindly. “He’s holding up. It’s not as bad as he was after... He’s fine,” he corrected himself quickly and it was Nate’s turn to sigh. When it came to Brad, ‘fine’ meant really nothing at all, or could mean anything.

But he could see for himself three weeks later, at Mike’s wedding. It was the one event neither he nor Brad could avoid, couldn’t talk their way out of it. Well, maybe Brad could, but he wouldn’t, not after Claire called him personally and teasingly asked if maybe he thought himself better than their little ceremony.

Nate both wanted to see him and feared it. Last time they had seen each other had been at Poke’s party, where Brad took one look at him and promptly left. Nate shouldn’t have expected anything more, but it still hurt like fucking hell. Maybe he shouldn’t have taken Peter, but they had known each other since college and it was a nice, familiar feeling to fall back on, and, well, Brad wasn’t even supposed to be there. And even if, he wasn’t supposed to care. He was the one to break up with Nate, after all.

But the serial dating right after that was puzzling in its timing, as if it held a connection. But Brad had clearly moved on, and if only Nate could do the same, everything would be just perfect.

Easier said than done, apparently getting over Brad Colbert wasn’t that easy. Maybe it had to get worse before it got better, but Nate had been waiting for the better for a while now, and it was as much of a no-show as ever. And then, well, Zoe, and Mike’s wedding.

Everything was alright at the church; Brad hang out in the back, a pained and long-suffering expression on his face, growing more strained every time Ray leaned over to whisper something to him. And apart from the growing irritation he did, indeed, seem fine, just as Walt said.

If by fine you meant depressed as all fuck and clearly not sleeping very well. Nate could tell the moment he laid eyes on Brad, and he was really surprised no one else seemed to notice.

“Colbert cleans up nice, doesn’t he?” Laura said, craning her head to look over Nate’s shoulder. Brad’s table was as far away from the one Nate was sitting at as Claire could possibly manage, apparently Mike has been talking to her.

Nate shook his head, quelled the desire to turn and look at Brad himself. He had been trying not to sneak looks at Brad for the better part of the reception and it wasn’t quite working out well for his sanity.

“Yes,” he agreed pleasantly, sure that Laura didn’t even hear him. It didn’t matter, because it was a lie as much as it was the truth; Brad looked fantastic as always, but the weariness and the trace of sadness in his gaze undercut the image, made Nate abandon the thoughts he would usually have at the sight of Brad Colbert in a tux.

At least he was doing well with not going over to Brad’s table and making an idiot out of himself. That was always something to take pride in. He would have probably manage to survive the entire evening with his dignity intact if he hadn’t gone out to get some fresh air, if he hadn’t chosen the secluded corner of the garden, away from the gazebo and the couples sneaking out for a romantic moment, away from the twinkling lights and the music.

He wasn’t the only one to have the same idea, to look for a place to avoid crowds. Of course, because the universe loved to make Nate’s life as difficult as possible when it came to Brad fucking Colbert.

“Sorry,” Brad said, stepping back, turning to walk back into the house.

Nate laughed. “You won’t find a better place to hide. Believe me, I tried,” he muttered and shifted, leaving enough space on the bench for three people to sit. “Don’t worry, you’re not obliged to indulge me with conversation.”

Brad gave him a long look, Nate could feel it against his skin, but he didn’t look up, didn’t shift at all apart from turning his glass in his hands. It was almost empty already.

Brad sat down, as far away from Nate as humanly possible. Nate hadn’t expected anything less.

“Claire looked lovely,” he said and Nate turned to stare at him incredulously.

“Are you indulging me with conversation?”

“I’ve figured, why the fuck not? You’re not sycophantic or pompous or an absolute moron, which I can’t say about most of the guests here. There’s also the drunk contingent, and the nice ladies who want to soothe my broken heart. Sad as it may be, you might be my best bet for a decent conversation tonight. There was Hasser, too, but he fucked off half an hour ago, claiming he was the designated driver for Ray. And Poke’s too busy with the wife and kids.”

“I’m flattered I rate right after Walt and Tony,” Nate nodded. “So. Yes, the bride looked radiant. Mike’s a very lucky guy.”

“That would do,” Brad agreed thoughtfully. “We can now fall into comfortable silence.”

Nothing comfortable between them, Nate didn’t point out. “Is your heart broken?” he asked, surprising himself. But it’s been playing around in his head for a while now, ever since Zoe had left for France, and he had enough to drink now that he could ask.

“Nate,” Brad said, warning plain in his voice. But he didn’t move, didn’t just stand up and walk away, and that in itself was amazing.

“I’ve figured as much.” Nate turned to look at him, really look at Brad, not the stolen glances from earlier, not trying to hide it. “So, she left you. Not counting the flings, because I don’t think you are, where does this leave you? Two for three, and I bet you think I didn’t leave only because you managed to pull a fast one on me and leave first.”

He might have as well punched Brad, judging from the look on his face. This was the worst of places to have this conversation, even if it was long time coming. “I did us both a favor.”

It wasn’t exactly a denial, if anything, it confirmed Nate’s suspicions. He shook his head and stood up. “For future reference, Brad. Don’t do me any more favors.”

He managed about two steps before Brad reached out, hand closing on Nate’s forearm, fingers tightening a little too hard. Nate would be able to feel them the next day, places where Brad’s fingernails dug in, even through the cloth of Nate’s shirt, and he marvelled at that. “It was the right thing to do,” Brad told him.

Nate shook his head, turned in Brad’s grip and faced him, looking up at the tight set of Brad’s jaw, at the way the corner of his mouth turned downwards. “No, it wasn’t,” he said, careful to keep his voice even, gentle. He didn’t feel anger anymore, not this close to Brad, everything had been washed away by the keen sense of loss. “I would have stayed if you let me. For however long you would have me, I would have stayed,” he muttered and pressed his lips to Brad’s, too briefly, chastely.

Brad let go of his arm, his lips going soft under Nate’s, just for a second, before Nate stepped away, shrugged and looked down at his feet on the grass, fitting right in between Brad’s. He turned to walk away.

“Nate,” Brad muttered but Nate didn’t stop, just headed towards the house.

 

xxi.

It gets better after that evening, after they sit in Brad’s hotel room and have much more coffee than it is advisable for anyone who should be up bright and early and ready on set. They talk about nothing at all, as far as Brad can tell, but he feels better than he had in months.

It’s still awkward, Nate seems to be carefully considering his words, rethinking the instinctive responses before he chooses his answers and questions, and Brad doesn’t quite like that, but he’s doing the very same thing, so he probably shouldn’t be complaining.

But it’s close enough to how they used to be with each other, sometime when the shooting on Alternate was starting and they didn’t quite read each other’s faces quite that well, when they were still taking each other’s measure.

Susannah notices, so it must be showing on screen, and she flashes them a thumbs up after the first take the next day. Their characters are getting to know each other so it works, but Brad is fairly confident they could pull off the other scenes too.

When he says that to Nate, during lunch, Nate flashes a quick grin at him. “I’m assured of this,” he says.

Brad wants to kiss him.

It’s not a new thought, clearly, despite his reluctance to let himself think of Nate for a very long time now, Nate has featured heavily in his fantasies and at some point, Brad has stopped even trying to reign them in.

But it’s different. Or rather, it’s all too familiar, it’s how he used to feel around Nate when he was first falling for him, light and breathless and like nothing else existed but Nate’s smile.

He shouldn’t be starting this again; if he tried Nate probably would just punch him right in the face, and he would have every right to it.

Brad does know he has fucked himself over with this, but there you go. Story of his life.

He figures he should be content with this, with Nate back in his life and not giving up on him, and sometimes he even manages to convince himself he’s fine like this. That he doesn’t need anything more.

That lying to himself part? Not going so well.

“What the fuck are you thinking?” Ray asks the moment he visits the set, when they’re sitting in Brad’s trailer and Nate is doing a crossword while Brad reads through the revisions to his next scene.

Nate doesn’t even look up. “Nice to see you too, Ray.”

Ray stares at him. “I’ll get to you later,” he promises.

Nate smiles brilliantly and flips him off, stands up and picks at a lint on his jeans. “Always a pleasure, Ray.”

Ray shakes his head. “I can’t even,” he tells Brad, his eyes wide. He doesn’t even launch into one of his rants, just sits down in the chair Nate vacated and glares at Brad like he’s trying to kill him with laser beams.

Business as usual.

 

xxii.

Things were busy ever since Brad got the lead in Thor. You’d think it would be more difficult to try and win the part than it would be handling the aftermath, but you’d be wrong. Walt was damn tired and Ray was irritable, more than usual, and that made Walt outwardly calm and sweet as pie, and inwardly seething.

Well, not seething as such. But he wasn’t in the best of moods, and Brad was being fucking difficult.

“I fucking hate those dog and pony shows,” he was saying and Walt rolled his eyes.

“Movie star. You should be kind of over that. It’s less than three minutes of screen time and it’s the kind of exposure we could use to promote the movie internationally. People all over the world watch this shit, Brad.”

“I think you’re right,” Brad said and Walt cringed internally, because this tone of voice never bode well. “It is shit.”

Walt sighed. He didn’t want to resort to this, but there you were. And there was fucking Brad Colbert so, really, no choice. “Kodak Theatre is a really big fucking place,” he pointed out. Brad looked at him, his eyebrows raised and Walt shrugged. “Chances you run into him are minimal and you can easily circumnavigate.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Walt didn’t quite say ‘bitch, please’. Ray would have, but there was a reason why Walt dealt with the majority of their clients. The sane clients, that was. “For the record, you’re an idiot. I’ve been refraining from pointing it out for a while now, but if you think you can spend your entire life avoiding Nate and making the best you can trying not to face the biggest mistake of your life? Change jobs. This town is awfully fucking small, you’re bound to run into each other.”

Brad looked at him for a long moment. “Ray’s a bad influence on you.”

“You’ll present the award?”

“Sure, why not.”

His voice had that certain wooden quality that meant not everything was alright at Casa de Brad, but Walt’s objective had been reached. He bit his tongue to keep himself from saying more, from pointing out that Brad should just fucking get over himself and get back with Nate before it was too late, before Nate really moved on.

It had been a long while, true, and Nate was as fucked as Brad, but between the two of them, he was the more likely to buy a clue and sort out his life, find a girl or a guy and have a nice life. Some days Walt hoped for that, because Nate deserved to actually find some happiness, but most of the time he dreaded the day, because this would be the moment when Brad’s fucking heart would be completely broken.

Some days, Walt just wanted to fucking lock them both in a broom closet for a few hours. Maybe days, considering Brad’s emotional retardation and Nate’s stubbornness. A broom closet with reinforced steel doors. He knew people who could arrange that.

 

xxiii.

Nate had been told that the Oscars was something you really enjoyed the first time around, with all its excitement and glamour, that it was something to remember.

Certainly to remember, but he wasn’t sure he was quite getting the hang of enjoying everything. Beth was, certainly. Nate invited her on a spur of the moment, partly because she had been spending most of her days at home, changing diapers and being barfed on, and partly because, as Mike pointed out, going solo wasn’t quite kosher and bringing a family member cut down the gossip and the inquires to the nature of the relationship with his guest, and that just wasn’t something Nate was ready for yet. 

“You are my favourite brother,” Beth told him cheerfully after she realised their seats were only two rows behind George Clooney. Nate was going to remember to keep this tidbit in mind next time she was yelling at him over the phone for something. Usually for being an idiot and usually concerning his love life and his refusal to be set on blind dates.

She didn’t even go easy on him after he came out, just gave his personal cell number to her yoga trainer’s brother. Sometimes you just couldn’t win with Beth.

“You have your speech?” she asked now, absently folding the skirt of her dress around her so it wouldn’t wrinkle.

“Sure,” he muttered. He wouldn’t need one, the bookies were pricing his win at 13/1, which was actually much better than he would give himself, considering the other nominees. But he had been told in no uncertain terms that he had to have a speech ready and had spent the previous evening revising the one line over and over again, striking it out and writing it back in.

Maybe Beth was right all those times when she pointedly told him he was behaving like a thirteen year old girl. He could at least take comfort in the thought that he wasn’t the only one, he was in a very good company. Walt called Mike, Mike called him, it was very much reminiscent of junior high, but the point of the exercise was that Nate wasn’t unprepared for the sight of Brad Colbert in a tux, looking like a million bucks, smiling from the stage.

“I can’t believe you got to fuck him,” Beth muttered into his ear. Nate briefly missed the times when he could respond by pulling at her pigtails in retaliation. Except he never even did that. “Your life is so fucking weird now, Nathaniel Christopher Fick.”

“Says the woman who had puke in her hair three hours ago and now is sitting two rows behind George Clooney.” He didn’t bother to deny sleeping with Brad. He used to, but it was a battle lost before it started, Sarah and Beth always had ways of getting him to spill everything. In this case, Sarah had shown up with a bottle of tequila a few days after Nate came back from England and he was still jet lagged and adjusting to the time zone change, and, well.

Beth left him after the ceremony, because she was at that stage still when she couldn’t leave her daughter for longer than few hours or she got withdrawal symptoms. Nate put her in a cab, but only after she made him promise he would actually go to the party and not ‘go back home and cry into your ice cream’.

He had begged his parents for a brother, really.

Of course he chose the same party someone made Brad attend, it was just his luck. He spent half of the evening arguing with Zooey, which was always greatly entertaining, but at some point she abandoned him in search of Joseph and when Nate turned around he was staring into Brad’s eyes and unable to look away.

Things like that happened to him.

“So, what is it that one says? Better luck next time?” Brad offered lightly and Nate shrugged.

“It’s an honor to be nominated,” he stated with all the earnestness he could muster, trying not to smile around the line. It didn’t matter that it was true, it was still a cliche.

“Since I don’t think I’ll ever find out, I’ll have to take your word for it,” Brad said, taking a sip from his champagne glass and grimacing. He hated champagne, but apparently it was the only thing served here.

“You could always do a Holocaust movie,” Nate suggested helpfully.

“Ray would love that. Think of all the jokes.”

“Believe me, I’m trying not to.” Ray had a whole array of Hitler knock knock jokes. Once you’ve heard the top ten, you could never be the same. Nate shook his head. “Why are you even here?” he asked, not unkindly, just curiously. It was as far from what Brad would want to do with his evening as humanly possible; he could get roped into presenting an award, but this was stranger.

“Walt yelled at me,” Brad offered, the tone of his voice hinting that it was a joke, but Nate could tell he meant it.

“Must have been very traumatic for you,” Nate allowed, getting a small smile in response. He missed this.

He had promised himself, after Mike’s wedding, to get over Brad. It wasn’t going all that well but he’s been making progress. He could now look and Brad and miss him terribly and yet not feel like he was drowning anymore. Small steps.

Brad looked away then back up at Nate, something shifting in his gaze, the line of his mouth tightening. “Nate,” he said, and Nate pretty much hated this, the way such a small thing like his name forming on Brad’s lips could throw him off.

“How are Walt and Ray anyway? I’ve heard a rumour about Vegas a while back and I couldn’t believe it.”

“Nate,” Brad repeated forcefully, Nate’s eyes snapping back to his. It wasn’t fair, it just wasn’t fucking fair that Brad still held sway over him, that Nate couldn’t look away.

He couldn’t do this, not again.

“I’m seeing someone,” he said quietly. Brad’s eyes widened, then closed. He schooled his expression down but not without effort and Nate ached at the brief hurt that flickered across Brad’s face, but he didn’t want to take his words back. He wondered idly if it hurt a little like Veronica or Jess or Nancy, or did it hurt like Zoe, like Julie.

“And keeping it under wraps, I’m impressed,” Brad said finally.

“It’s nothing serious yet. But James is moving to LA for a while, so I hope it could be,” he added and Brad nodded in acknowledgment.

“So, what does one say?” he asked again, his smile more of a pained grimace, if it was a smile to begin with. “Better luck next time.”

He walked away before Nate could respond. The sinking feeling in his stomach was now sadly familiar.

 

xxiv.

They’ve been shooting the chase scene for the whole week and Nate can feel it in every damn muscle in his body. There’s a really impressive bruise on his forearm and the makeup girls are going to have great fun with it.

It’s the only really physical sequence in the entire movie, but fuck if it doesn’t make up for the long talky scenes in the first act. Nate’s in a pretty good shape, but he hadn’t done anything this intense since the constant night chases of the Alternate and he has the muscle pain to prove it.

Of course, Brad ‘I do my own stunts’ Colbert is unimpressed. “I should have known all those indie bullshit flicks would turn you into a pussy artiste,” he tells Nate as he hands him an icepack.

“You spend a lot of time considering my artistic choices?” Nate shoots back, only the question comes out less mocking than he aimed for, softer. His fingers brush over Brad’s on the icepack and he shivers. It’s not from the cold.

“Only occasionally, when I feel like something more sophisticated than pay per view porn,” Brad offers and catches on seconds later, his eyes closing like a child’s when they want to disappear, waiting for the earth to open and swallow him whole.

Nate laughs, an edge of hysteria coloring it, and shakes his head. Laughing hurts, he’s discovering, and he presses the icepack to his shoulder. “Did you just compare my movies to porn?”

“Intellectual wanking isn’t that different from the actual one,” Brad mutters, sitting down, fingers pressed to his temple, running down his face in dismay.

Nate gives him a look. “Really? Spend a lot of time comparing the two?”

They’re on a dangerous fucking path here, and Nate should probably back off now, plead temporary insanity due to the painkillers haze and go take a cold shower, but he doesn’t.

Hell, it probably is insanity brought on by painkillers, but they have about three weeks of shooting left, and Nate doesn’t know how he’s going to go back to not seeing Brad every day, not spending every evening playing cards or chess or watching really bad movies together. He’s not ready for it, he never was.

Brad looks at him, his eyebrows raised as he visibly debates his next remark. “Are you asking me if I jerk off to your movies?”

It’s not what Nate expected, but the reaction his body provides him with isn’t surprising. He moves the icepack up his shoulder, to the back of his neck, then to his cheek, hoping it would alleviate some of the tension, help him get his body under control. Brad watches his movement with intent, his eyes dark and glazed over.

“Do you jerk off to my movies?” he asks and Brad’s breath hitches. Neither of them is ready for this, Nate thinks, but he wants it anyway.

“Not to your movies,” Brad says and reaches out, takes the icepack out of Nate’s hands. “Come on,” he says, his voice low, and pushes softly against Nate’s shoulder, indicating for him to turn. He places it against Nate’s back, somehow knowing instinctively where it hurts the most. Nate thinks it serves the double purpose of not having to look Nate in the eye for a moment.

“Thanks,” Nate says after a long moment, after he listens to Brad’s soft breath for so long his own breathing aligns, loud in his ears.

“Are you seeing anyone?” Brad asks, so quietly Nate thinks he misheard.

“Brad...”

“It’s a simple question, Nathaniel.”

Few months ago he would have said it was none of Brad’s business. Pointed out that Brad had left him and he lost any right to ask. Few weeks ago he’d maybe make a crack about the fact that if Brad wanted to know, he could read about it on a few chosen blogs. Now, he just shakes his head. “You know I’m not.”

Brad sighs. “I know better than to presume anything about you anymore. Learned my lesson,” he says and stands up, his movements slow and hesitant, as if he was the one with muscle pain. “Alright,” he mutters and returns the icepack to Nate, not really looking at him. “Early morning tomorrow, get some rest,” he says and Nate nods numbly.

He’s well familiar with Brad’s retreating form, but now for the first time he thinks that maybe Brad will make his way back.

 

xxv.

In the month or so following the Oscars ceremony Brad went into what Ray took to describing as a ‘funk’. Brad generally thought of it as taking a breather from the madness of the awards season, but a retarded hick with ADHD like Ray couldn’t understand it.

Sure, he worked on his bikes a lot, but they needed care. He couldn’t even drive them as often as he wanted, what with all the time spent on various locations, or with the fuss everyone would be making if he broke something. He was surrounded by fucking mother hens.

Mel sent him carefully worded e-mails which obviously had been redacted to cut out the obscenities and Ray visited every few days, prompting Brad to finally choose something to star in, because this was getting fucking ridiculous.

Brad tried to explain the concept of fucking vacations, but Ray just told him that in this town it was called rehab and the only twelve step program Brad needed was for his idiocy, so clearly that conversation went very well.

And then the screenplay for Screwby arrived. Brad started reading it absently over his morning coffee and completely forgot of any plans he had for the day. On page three something in his stomach tightened and didn’t let go throughout, the same feeling he had when he bought his first bike. Same feeling he got when he saw Nate smile at him for the first time, really smile.

Brad didn’t fall in love easily, no matter what Ray would tell you, but he thought he might be in love with that script. And it would certainly take his mind off Nate, of Nate and James, and the few pictures of them that made it into the papers in the post-Oscars frenzy of interest.

But no matter the need for a distraction, he wanted the part badly. For the first time in a long while he read for the part and waited impatiently for the call back.

“It’s good to see you excited about something,” Ray told him after they got a call he was in. “Now stop, because your smile is freaking me the fuck out.”

The next day, Brad got a google alert on Nate, announcing the new cast members for Screwby. There were a few links to blog entries from the Alternate fanbase, gleeful with the thought of the Fick-Colbert reunion.

Brad should have known something would happen to fuck with him, because that was exactly how the universe worked, but he felt less angry than he should, less disappointed. Somewhere in the back of his mind he has been waiting for the chance.

 

xxvi.

The last day of shooting doesn’t exactly mean saying goodbye to everyone. There’ll be reshoots, Nate thinks, and then, few months later, the promotion process, the conferences and press junkets and the premieres.

It still feels like an end. And with the wrap-party planned for the evening, Nate grows nervous, his hands shaking when they call the last take. Brad twirls Susannah around and she playfully swats his shoulder, adds a few insults for a good measure, and Nate laughs along with everyone else, but he can’t quite bring himself to look at them.

He doesn’t quite have the best experience with the wrap-parties involving Brad.

He contemplates not going, but that would be a coward’s way out. The last few days, the last three weeks, Brad seemingly ignored whatever passed between them when he asked whether Nate was seeing someone, as if he had forgotten about it, as if it was unimportant.

But there were moments when Nate looked up and caught Brad’s gaze before he could look away, the moment stretching between them like a piano wire. He waited for something to happen but nothing had, and he was slowly going crazy from the build-up.

More crazy than usual. It was Brad Colbert - when it came to him, Nate never quite regained his senses.

There is an easy solution to this, Nate thinks as he changes from John’s clothes for the last time, a little sad to leave the character behind. An easy solution would be to make his way to Brad’s trailer and kiss him the moment he opens the door. It’s not that Nate hasn’t thought about that, for the last few days he barely thought of anything else.

But he’s more cautious with his heart now than he used to be, so he doesn’t. Survive this party, he thinks, and maybe they’ll get through this unscathed, maybe he will count this as a win, as a movie that helped him regain Brad’s friendship if not his love.

There, he said it. What he’s looking for in Brad’s gaze, what he’s been searching for all those weeks is any sign that Brad might love him still. Because he had, back then, Nate’s sure of this, he only doesn’t know if it makes it all better or so much worse.

 

xxvii.

Brad tries to do the knot on his tie three times before he decides to fuck it and go without; his fingers are fumbling over the material, the slight tremor making him clumsy.

He’s been waiting for this for the last three weeks. In some way, he’s been waiting for months, years. The last three weeks have just been an exercise in torture, every time Nate looked at him with soft eyes, searching and unsure. And yet Brad couldn’t quite bring himself to act, wanted to at least finish the shoot before he started anything, on the off chance that Nate would rightly just turn on his heel and leave.

The wrap-up party, though... there’s some poetry in this, almost a full circle, started when Brad decided to act like a fucking idiot. People had been trying to tell him for years that he was emotionally screwed up in the head, should have listened before he acted. Should have trusted Nate.

Speaking of people trying to tell him things, Ray calls him half an hour before the party and Brad contemplates not picking up, but he gives in in the end. Could be actually important. Turns out it’s Walt, calling from Ray’s phone, probably having just pried it out of Ray’s hands and stopping him from drunk-dialing. Been known to happen.

“Ray would like to tell you he moved your interview with the Empire for the day after tomorrow, so you have tomorrow free,” Walt says, something pointed in his voice and Brad blinks.

“Why would he do that?” he asks carefully, because Ray had been pretty adamant about Brad doing that interview as soon as possible. Of course, maybe he’s doing ‘shrooms again and it’s fucking with his perception of time. And reality. Also known to happen.

Walt’s quiet for a moment, and when Walt is actually taking time to choose his words carefully, you know it’s serious. “Wrap-up. We’re not exactly stupid.”

Ray is saying something in the background and Walt covers the phone with his hand, but his voice is still audible. “No, I won’t put him on speaker. No. No. Fine,” he says and then he’s back to his normal phone voice. “Ray on speaker, brace yourself,” he warns.

“Don’t fuck this up, Brad, we’re all tired. And don’t let Nate fuck this up, either.”

“Ray,” Brad warns and he can hear Ray snort.

“Yeah, I know, fuck you, Ray. Solid copy, homes. But you know what, in case you missed it, your pal Ray Ray has been on the set of your little love child of a movie recently and if you don’t see the way Nate looks at you, even after everything, then you better take...” The rant stops abruptly as Walt turns off the speaker.

“He’s not wrong, Brad,” Walt tells him.

Brad sighs and grips the phone a little more tightly. “Easy to say, don’t fuck up,” he mutters and Walt is silent for a long moment, long enough for Brad to think the connection has gone bad.

“You have one main advantage. Nate already loves you,” he points out, as if it was that easy, and then hums under his breath before Brad can respond. “Empire interview, day after tomorrow. Ray will text you the details later, when he’s not high as a kite and unable to type. Thank Jesus, because the last time he drunk-typed we’ve been almost sued by Oprah. Again,” he adds and disconnects and Brad turns the phone in his hands a few times before pocketing it.

He arrives early for the party, only a few people are already there, but Nate is one of them. He’s always punctual, to the point of being obsessive about it; not something you would expect from a movie star, but then again, Nate.

He looks up when Brad walks in, as if sensing his presence. It’s uncanny, and it’s just how it used to be and Brad can’t help it, he smiles instinctively, nods at Nate with a grin. Nate looks away, but before Brad can really register the disappointment, he’s saying something apologetic to Anne and then he’s making his way over to Brad.

“Anne says someone’s been stealing souvenirs from the set,” Nate tells him, starting with a middle of the conversation because it probably seems easier. Brad nods, he heard that story. Bits of costumes, a few props, someone stole Brad’s chair. Nate gives him an assessing look. “Want to tell me something, Colbert?”

“Why would I steal your shirts?” Brad asks, a smile forcing its way onto his lips but he holds it back for the sake of the line.

“How do you know it was my shirts that got stolen?” Nate counters, as he’s expected to do.

Brad shrugs, looks away guiltily. “Must have heard that from someone somewhere,” he says and makes a mistake of looking at Nate, who’s clearly trying not to laugh, the corner of his mouth twitching dangerously, and Brad can’t help a snort. “You know,” he says quietly after a moment and waits for Nate to shift and look at him. “If I wanted to get your shirts, I would have gone about it the old fashioned way.”

Nate holds his gaze steadily. “Hey baby, nice shirt, it would look great on my floor?” he deadpans and Brad tilts his head.

“Yes,” he says plainly, makes an effort not to look away, not to hide from Nate. It’s been a second nature to him for a long time, to hide every feeling away, store them and keep them unused until he exercises them in a controlled environment, in front of a camera. But Nate has worked through his defences once already.

Now it’s different, however. Now Brad wants to let him in, wants to ask him to please come inside. It’s scary as all fuck and he doesn’t mind.

“Brad,” Nate says and somehow, his voice breaks on that one syllable. There’s no mistaking the look in his eyes, and Brad might have been unsure before, but now Nate isn’t holding back either. Then he looks away and Brad feels the loss physically. “I think we should stay for at least two hours,” Nate points out matter-of-factly. “Meet me outside after that?”

“Alright,” Brad says, glancing at his watch nervously already and Nate shakes his head, reaches out to still Brad’s hand, fingers closing around Brad’s wrist. For all the world it looks as if he’s reading off Brad’s wrist watch, the contraption that has been the butt of many jokes on the set.

“Alright,” Nate repeats, his thumb stroking across Brad’s wrist, right above the watch. Brad’s pulse speeds up in anticipation and Nate smiles slightly, like he can feel it under his fingers.

 

xxviii.

Nate breathes in the night air, the breeze cold enough against his skin that he wishes he took something else than a light jacket. Still, hadn’t quite expected to stand around outside and wait for Brad to show up.

He doesn’t worry Brad’s not here yet, he has seen Brad inside, trying to disentangle himself from a conversation with two of their wonderful co-stars, whom Nate usually liked quite a bit, but who were annoying him with their current timing.

“You’re here,” Brad says softly and Nate doesn’t startle at all, even though a shiver runs up his spine in response to Brad’s tone. There’s relief mixed with amazement and Nate turns to look at him, to search his face for the accompanying look. He used to be able to read Brad quite well, but it’s nothing compared to now, because now Brad seems to have abandoned the obsessive need to control his every emotion, keep it from showing.

It’s not there for everyone but it’s there for Nate and it’s breathtaking.

“Where else would I be?”

Brad ducks his head, closes his eyes briefly, the evening shadows shifting across his face as he moves, obscuring his eyes for a moment. “I don’t know. I used to think--” he stops when Nate steps forward, reaches out to place his hand on the nape of Brad’s neck, to pull him close. He’s not gentle or hesitant, he hopes he’ll have time for this later.

“I’m here,” he says into Brad’s mouth before he kisses him, licks his way inside and finds what he’s been desperately missing for all this time. Brad makes a sound deep in his throat, stumbles forward, pressed close against Nate, his fingers getting tangled in Nate’s hair. “I’m here,” he repeats and Brad steps back, breathing harshly.

“Your place is closer, I think,” he says and Nate laughs, reaches out once again, his fingers briefly lacing with Brad’s before he steps back and starts moving.

Their steps echo in the rhythm of his heartbeat, getting louder. Brad’s hand brushes his as they walk, it’s not quite hand-holding but it’s close enough and Nate lets himself hope that this time he might not lose it, that this time, he gets to have this forever.

He fumbles for his keys outside the door, distracted by the way Brad’s close behind him, his breath tickling Nate’s ear, the hair on his neck standing up. Brad hesitates in the doorway, reaches out to touch the doorframe as if he’s steadying himself, head bowed. Nate turns on his heel and watches him.

“Come in,” he says, his voice hoarse.

There are boxes everywhere in the apartment. His rent is not up until next week, but he’s been packing his things up for the last few days, whenever he had the time, and with the frantic wrapping up of the movie, there wasn’t much of that time.

“When are you leaving?” Brad asks, like he’s trying for polite conversation, but his voice is breaking over the words, his breathing is uneven and harsh.

“Not for a few days yet. Figured I could at least see the city before I do. It’s been months and I haven’t had the chance,” Nate shrugs. He hovers for a moment, not able to decide in which way he should move, closer to Brad like he wants to, or put some distance between them for just that moment he needs to have to think clearly. “Would you like something to drink?” he asks finally, stepping away.

Brad’s eyes follow him across the room, watching intently. “Some coffee, if it’s not that much trouble.”

Nate snorts. “Of course it’s too much trouble, but I’m too polite a host to point it out,” he offers curtly and Brad rolls his eyes at him. Nate missed that too, the exasperation and the familiarity of their mocking each other. It feels good to have it back.

Brad sits down on the couch, still watching Nate, but there’s seriousness in his gaze now, no less heated but different from the gleam in them after they kissed. “I know I’ve been a monumental idiot,” he offers and Nate shrugs, filling the cups to the brims.

“I’m not going to argue that point.”

“Thanks.”

Nate sighs, handing him one of the mugs. He debates moving to sit in the armchair, but in the end just perches on the coffee table, his legs fitting in between Brad’s, inches away from touching. “I could have handled some of the things better, but yeah, you’ve been an idiot.”

“Feel free to offer some other invectives too,” Brad mutters, his head lowered. Nate nods, places two fingers under Brad’s chin, making him look up.

“As long as you know that,” he mutters, leaning in, his forehead resting against Brad’s. “I don’t know if it would have changed anything,” he says slowly, his voice automatically lowering, the words more of a whisper than anything else, “but I could have told you.”

“Told me what?”

“That I loved you,” Nate says and feels the shiver that runs through Brad’s body under his hands. There’s a surge of excitement, yes, but there’s also a pained flicker in Brad’s eyes at the past tense. “Love you still. Impossible to stop, you know?” he adds softly.

“I have a vague idea.” Brad’s voice is rough and he takes a moment to put away the coffee mug, still untouched. His remark could be flippant, but what isn’t there in his words is in his voice, in his eyes. “I...” he starts to say, fingers tangled in Nate’s shirt, pulling him close, the shift making Nate stumble forwards. He doesn’t quite fall to the floor, but he drops to one knee, hands flat on Brad’s thighs for balance.

He shakes his head slowly, trying to contain a smile. “You know, if you wanted me on my knees...”

“I want you everywhere,” Brad says simply and leans in, and instead of pulling Nate up onto the couch lets Nate drag him down to the floor, their limbs tangled together, Brad’s lips finding Nate’s.

The leg of the coffee table is painfully digging into Nate’s side but he can’t bring himself to care.

 

xxix.

Brad wakes up to the sound of his own cellphone spouting Ray’s ringtone. It’s so much easier to avoid him when Brad’s forewarned and doesn’t make a mistake of not looking at the caller id.

Nate reaches out, his hand neatly circumnavigating Brad’s and picking up the phone before Brad has the chance. He does glance at the caller id and then, slowly, probably so Brad could protest if he wanted to, thumbs up the keypad before answering the call. “Morning, Ray,” he says. “Brad will have to call you back.”

Ray’s voice is loud enough to carry through and Brad could make out the distinctive ‘motherfucker’ before Ray’s laughing and disconnecting. “Should have let it go to the voicemail,” Brad offers.

Nate shrugs, moves to lie back down, propped up on his elbow, skin still flushed and sleep-warm. His eyes are incredibly green. “He would have called again. And again, and then a few times more, until you picked up and called him names, and by that time he would have forgotten what he wanted to talk to you about in the first place, which means he’d be calling again in a few minutes.” His smile is slow and lazy in appearing but no less brilliant for it. “You forget I actually know Ray,” he points out.

It’s a warning as much as it is a joke, Brad knows, it’s Nate reminding him that he knows Brad too. “I’m not going anywhere,” Brad says and Nate gives him a long look.

“Not without your clothes you’re not,” Nate agrees amiably, but the look on his face belies the flippancy. He reaches out, his fingers gently tracing the shell of Brad’s ear, caressing the skin of his neck. “I don’t need you to make promises,” he tells Brad.

“I love you.” The words tumble out of Brad’s mouth unbidden but not unwelcome. He means them, hearing them out loud only reinforces the feeling, but he hadn’t quite meant to blurt them out like this, like they’re not important. “That’s not a promise,” he points defensively and Nate laughs, kisses him on the nose.

“I think that’s where you’re wrong,” he mutters. “But I’ll make you a promise in return. If you ever try to walk out on me like that again, I’m going to tie you up in the basement until you change your mind. And you know that will put us on one of those Lifetime’s True Hollywood Story movies of the week you hate so much.”

“Who would play me?”

“I think there’s something wrong with your priorities.”

Brad shakes his head slowly. “No. I think I have them absolutely right,” he mutters, kissing Nate’s shoulder. “I’ll show you,” he adds and proceeds to do just that.


End file.
